French stall on lamb war cash
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• British hauliers who have had their trucks attacked and loads destroyed by French farmers are still waiting for compensation. Some of the claims are now four months old, and relate to violent raids carried out in France during July.
At the height of the socalled "lamb war", French President Francois Mitterrand agreed under pressure from the British Prime Minister Mrs Thatcher to pay full compensation for the value of the loads being lost.
The British embassy in Paris is now processing six compensation claims and a spokesman in the agricultural office told CM "we are doing all we can".
The embassy says the French government has been slow to handle matters such as these in the past, and they will keep pressure on the French authorities to honour the President's undertaking as hard as possible.
Central Road Transport of Crewkerne in Somerset is one of the haulage companies seeking compensation.
It had a load of lamb hijacked and driven into the city centre square in Lyon in early October (CM October 18). The protesters destroyed the entire load, causing damage worth more than £16,000. "We haven't received a penny yet" said a spokesman for the firm.
It seems, unlikely, however, that the situation is going to improve. The leading French farmers' union, FNSEA, warned last week that "we want satisfaction or else our demonstrations will continue."
They claim that Britain's lamb hauliers will bear the brunt of their anger until the French government renegotiates the EEC lamb regulations. The French farmers are convinced that the regulations unfairly favour British producers.
More than 200 French farmers gathered at Nevers, in the department of Nievre 170 km south of Paris, on two nights early last week and erected barriers to halt foreign meat trucks. The local FNSEA secretary general Hubert Delourine said, "because our authorities don't bring in the police against these improper imports we do it ourselves.
We will continue to demonstrate against a community regulation which allows the English to sell lamb at five francs (54p) a kilogramme on the market when we cannot produce it for less than 22 francs (£2.37p)."